Page 14 - The Cormorant Issue 14

ACSC Air Power Visit to RAF Waddington – A Land Perspective
Maj Lisa Gill
“I’ll hit the brakes – he’ll fly right by”.... “Yee-ha Jester’s dead”
Actually, and rather disappoint- ingly, neither of our pilots came out with any Top Gun quotes, I merely thought that I might indulge you with a few to get you in the mood... The ACSC visit to RAF Waddington
good humour. We flew at 450 knots and at a height of 500 feet from Lincoln inland up to Whitby to attack our ‘bombing target’ and then climbed up and over the North Sea to undertake some aerial showmanship. It was at this point, with no clear horizon, that I had to confess to the onset of nausea and thankfully my kindly pilot obliged by taking things easy – no such pedestrian activity for Ed, who certainly got the most out of his time in the air. The upside down view of Flamborough Head was quite spectacular!
So, forgive me for indulging most of this article in my Top Gun re-run, but I make no apologies as it was a fabulous experience that only served to increase my estimation of the ability of fast jet pilots who have to multi-task under significant stresses - which takes nothing from my admiration for tank commanders who do a similar task in the Land environment. My fellow stu- dents enjoyed the Air Power demonstrations, and of those that I managed to see, I was certainly impressed by the enthusiasm and willing engagement from the airmen and women. One final word, having just completed our ‘Policy to Capability’ phase of the Course, and having discussed budgets in depth: only the RAF could have arranged for ‘posh portaloos’ with carpet, piped music and ‘White Company’ toiletries – very impressive!
was the first of three Frontline Command Capability visits and, by week 5 of our course, it would be fair to say that there was not one student (or indeed Directing Staff) who was not looking forward to escaping the Cormorant Hall and Syndicate Rooms.
For a handful of lucky students, this visit was also to be a once in a lifetime opportunity to be given a ride in a Hawk Jet Trainer. The A Division approach to picking the lucky few was for inter- ested parties to email stating why they should be chosen, in less than 30 words. Now at this point I must confess to having been a Top Gun ‘uber-fan’ in my youth (actually, I do still like to watch a re-run of Maverick in his flying suit, or playing bare-chested volleyball), and unfortunately I could not dampen my eagerness to apply. I was in reality torn between looking keen and apply- ing, and hence adding to the already significant egos that pilots already possess (apologies Oz, Kano, Darren et al - but you know it’s true), versus the proverbial ‘biting off my nose to spite my own face’....I chose the former! I would forgive readers for thinking that, on being selected, I must have felt quite smug; however, since being a small child I have memories of revisiting my meals more often than I care to remember on a number of journeys in cars and coaches and so I was not a little nervous of being thrown around at speed. To add to my weak stomach, I also had to contend with a fairly rigorous flying medical, where thankfully the doctor calmed my increasing fear of nausea.
We were to fly in a pair of Hawk Jets and I was teamed up with Cdr Ed Ahlgren for a flight on the most gloriously clear, sunny day. As advised, I religiously kept to soft drinks and dull food in the preceding 24 hours, and was duly fitted out for my flying outfit. Now for another confession: the ‘G-Pants’ were quite something to behold; similar to a pair of long chaps, but with the ability to blow up and compress – quite something!! The pre-flight video was a horror movie of ‘what might go wrong’ that Ed and I stared at incredulously – there would be no time to recall the myriad of safety bells and buttons if disaster struck and, besides, we were convinced that if it all went wrong, the
pilots would be long gone!
The flight lasted a full hour and our pilots were extremely experienced, capable, and full of
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